Power-Independent Monitoring - Interview with Startups of the Year Nominee, Lualtek

Hey Hackers,

Lualtek has been nominated in HackerNoon's annual Startup of the Year awards in Comiso, Italy.

Please vote for us here: https://hackernoon.com/startups/europe/europe-sicily-italy

Read more about us below to understand why we deserve your vote.

Meet Lualtek

Lualtek is the first solution able to monitor and automate changes in greenhouses and open fields without Internet and electrical supply. A full package, plug-and-play and ready to use, which involves the use of a transversal coverage and the integrated provision of the three main assets: LoRaWAN network, sensors/actuators, and artificial intelligence. It’s the ideal tool to create sustainable and efficient cultivations; it doesn’t need pre-existing technological configurations and it can be implemented in completely isolated areas. Lualtek’s web app and algorithm allow to efficiently manage sensors and automations and to maintain the pre-established conditions in a cultivation thanks to the scenarios’ logic.

The company’s Mission is therefore to provide entrepreneurs with the necessary tools to realize sustainable and efficient cultivation areas. Through data gathering and intelligent data analysis, Lualtek helps the entrepreneur to manage daily operations by guiding his or her choices and gaining trust and loyalty through time.

The company’s Vision is to become a reference point in the technological transition of the agricultural sector through concreteness and continuous innovation. The goal is to become an essential partner in the decision-making process and in the management of one’s cultivations: we wish to change agriculture by innovating outdated paradigms and by becoming a real Virtual Agronomist.

How We're Disrupting/Improving the Agritech Industry

We have made technology accessible to everyone. Our system is sustainable because doesn’t need installation, cables, computers on the field. A modular system that users can organize and implement at any time.

Standing Out from The Crowd

Current competitors who provide monitoring services use tools and technologies that require their installation through technicians who are specialized in wiring and installation of sensors and also in Wi-Fi access points and in the configuration of equipment.

Solutions that don’t use Wi-Fi also have limits linked to distance and radio disturbances, causing problems to the functioning of the system binding the positioning of sensors and radio signal, instead of positioning them in areas that consent to the crops’ correct monitoring (for example the analysis of the bord effect in several areas of the greenhouse, temperature analysis at different heights of the cultivation, analysis of the land values and of the environment based on possible slopes in big cultivation, etc.). For data transmission to software, competitors use Internet connection which must be available near the cultivated area and it allows the control unit to send data to software that is possibly usable even while moving.

LoRaWAN’s protocol, implemented with Lualtek’s system, allows to overcome all the issues of the existing system, and, along with being easy to integrate in any situation and at any level, it also allows to transmit data without radio disturbance and with maximum efficiency up to ten kilometres. Lualtek’s gateways receive the signal and send it in cloud, where the progressive web app elaborates data and it shows it to the user, who can now manage it in order to create automations and alerts.

Thanks to the installation of the actuators, Lualtek allows to automatize anything connected to electricity (irrigation, opening and closing of the side roofs, anti-freezing, ecc.) without the need to connect wires to the equipment that needs to be controlled: it integrates itself with the pre-existing electrical system, simply adding actuators that receive, through LoRaWan protocol, input provided by Lualtek’s algorithm along with the scenarios that the entrepreneur set.

Lualtek’s artificial intelligence also allows the entrepreneur to improve production and foresee the development of illnesses or pathogens thanks to data collected in one’s own cultivation and in nearby ones, in order to provide relevant advice referring to its situation and the place where the cultivation is.

Our Predictions/Thoughts on the Agritech Industry in 2023

When we say “agriculture 4.0.” what we mean is the evolution and progress of agriculture that has been made possible thanks to the automatic collection, integration, and analysis of previously isolated data coming from the field, and also from sensors and any other third part.

All the above is qualified by the use of 4.0 industrial technologies, which make it possible to create knowledge and support for the farmer in the decision-making process concerning his or her own business and his or her relationship with other parties that are present in the supply chain. This way, he or she can overcome the boundaries of a single business. The ultimate goal is to increase profitability and economic, environmental and social sustainability.

In the past few years, agriculture 4.0. has continued its development and growth in Italy, despite the significant crisis due to Covid-19 pandemic.

The Smart AgriFood observatory from Milano’s Politecnico University has estimated that in 2020 the 4.0. agricultural market in Italy reached 1,3 billion euros. In 2021, it’s growth hasn’t stopped: agriculture 4.0. has generated a 1,6 billion euros income in Italy, with a 23% increase compared to 2020 (also supported by tax incentives granted in order to support investments that were made in 4.0. solutions). At the same time, Italian companies’ surfaces that were cultivated with agricultural 4.0 tools increased and doubled in 2021 reaching 6% of total surface.

At a worldwide level, an Agritech business of 15 billion dollars was estimated (against 7,8 billion dollars in 2019).

Italy is also among the “top ten” for number of start-up companies in the industry and it is currently among the leaders regarding cultivated surfaces.

What word defines the state of Agritech in 2023?

According to the Smart AgriFood observatory, among the technologies implemented by 4.0. agricultural solutions, the ones that prevail are the ones regarding data management, with 71% of the solutions linked to their analysis (however only in a few cases there are linked to “big data”).

Consistently, a strong presence of Internet of things solutions are found (58%) which are able to gather and transmit data, and also there is a strong presence of “on cloud” systems implementation (19%).

Lualtek addresses its business to agricultural entrepreneurs who are open to innovation and that feel the need to improve automation and optimize the use of their resources thanks to monitoring, gathering, and intelligent data analysis in order to make their own cultivations sustainable and efficient while improving their work conditions (by reducing intellectual and manual working hours).

Hence, the company places itself at a B2B level and the reference market can be defined as a niche when it comes to its target (the value of the offer, the distribution channels and the relationships must be Tailor-made following very “few” clients’ needs) but these solutions can also be spread out to other agricultural sectors.

Considering the object of agricultural industries’ production, the 4.0. the agricultural market can be divided in the following macro-segments: Farming, Forestry, Livestock Monitoring, Fish Farm Monitoring, and Smart Green House.

Lualtek provides a vertical service dedicated mainly to the monitoring and automation of greenhouses (smart greenhouse) and open field crops (farming), regardless the specific type of culture. This way, the company establishes itself as the main actor in the development of “internet of farming”. In particular, Lualtek offers two types of technological solutions and it integrates them with each other: on one hand Lualtek provides “remote monitoring systems” (IoT sensors) that monitor crops and lands, and on the other hand it develops a “decision support system” (DSS) that feeds itself with data delivered from the first solution.

The enabled technologies used by Lualtek are: Data & analytics, internet of things, ICT systems on Cloud and software platforms.

Why we decided to participate in HackerNoon's Startup of the Year awards

We’d like to share our project with other hackers in the world that could help us to improve our ideas and our technology!

Final Thoughts

We’d like to change agriculture innovating decades-old obsolete paradigms, and we are doing in Sicily.